AV-TEST Product Review and Certification Report – Sep/2020

During August and September 2020 we evaluated 5 home user security products for MacOS Catalina. We always used the most current version of all products for the testing. They were allowed to update themselves and query their in-the-cloud services. We focused on malware detection, false positives and performance.

Antivirus for Mac

Version	8.1
Platform	MacOS Catalina 10.15.5
Report	204203
Date	Sep/2020

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Protection

Protection against malware infections
(such as viruses, worms or Trojan horses)

	Industry average	September
Detection of widespread and prevalent malware discovered in the last 4 months (the AV-TEST reference set) 73 samples used	99%	97.3%
Protection Score	5.5/6.0

Performance

Average influence of the product on computer speed in daily usage

	Industry average	September
Slower download of frequently-used applications 30 downloaded files	8%	0%
Slower launch of standard software applications 53 test cases applied	10%	5%
Slower installation of frequently-used applications 25 installed applications	3%	7%
Slower copying of files, locally and in a network 3,112 files copied	11%	4%
Performance Score	6.0/6.0

Usability

Impact of the security software on the usability of the whole computer
(lower values indicate better results)

	Industry average	September
False detections of legitimate software as malware during a system scan 191,362 samples used	0	0
False warnings concerning certain actions carried out whilst installing and using legitimate software 50 samples used	0	0
Usability Score	6.0/6.0

Evaluation based on a point system

All products can achieve a maximum of 6 points each in the three categories of protection, performance and usability. This means 18 points are the best possible test result.
At 10 points or higher, a product is awarded the AV-TEST seal of approval. Additional details ›